“That makes me shiver even now,” Dallandra said.
Valandario nodded her agreement and went on studying the talisman. Dallandra tested the willow water and found it pleasantly warm. She put on her glove, picked up a linen bandage, wrapped it around a big handful of lamb’s wool, then dipped the lump into the water to soak.
“Lie down again,” Dalla said to Rori. “And remember, it might sting.”
The dragon flopped onto his side, making the ground shudder and the water in the kettle slop back and forth. With her gloved hand, Dallandra laid the wet bandage over the wound and squeezed to let the medicinal seep into the cut. He flinched, then relaxed with a ripple of scales.
“Much better than itching,” he said.
“Good.” Dallandra glanced at Valandario, who had closed her hand over the talisman and was staring off at the horizon. “Val? Are you still with us?”
“Hmm?” Valandario looked at her. “My apologies. Now, about Haen Marn. Rori, I know that it disappeared. Do you know why, exactly?”
“It had the best reason in the world. Horsekin. One of their armies was marching straight for it.”
“I just thought of something.” Dallandra put the lump of cloth back into the herbwater to refresh. “At the time I assumed that the army was heading for Cengarn and that Haen Marn was merely on the way. Do you think they could have been planning to attack the island?”
“I have no idea,” Rori said. “I never saw them, only the trail they left behind. The tracks started and stopped by dweomer, Raena’s dweomer, or so you told me.”
“Why bring an army up to the Northlands and then take it away again?” Valandario sounded puzzled. “If they were actually going somewhere else?”
“No reason at all,” Rori said. “I wonder why Alshandra wanted to destroy Haen Marn?”
“She may have simply wanted to capture it,” Dallandra said, “though she did tend to destroy the things she coveted. I wonder if Evandar made some prophecy about the island that had to do with Elessario? She was determined to get Elessi back before she could be born.”
“That was the whole point of the wretched war.” Rori moved uneasily. “Could you put a bit more of that water on the cut? It’s better, but I can feel it still.”
Dallandra fished the sop out of the kettle and went back to work. “You’re missing something,” Valandario said suddenly. “Evandar made a prophecy about the island, most assuredly, but it didn’t have anything to do with Elessi. It was about Rori, and the spell book—the vision Ebañy saw in the black crystal.”
“Of course.” Dallandra tossed the sop back into the bucket again—the medicinal water had soaked through the glove and her fingertips were turning numb. “It’s another hint that the crystal somehow belongs to the island.”
“More than a hint,” Val hesitated, then spoke calmly of what must have been painful things. “After Jav was murdered, Alshandra appeared to me. She was party to the theft, and that means she must have seen the message in the crystal.”
“Maybe not.” Dallandra paused to pull off the wet glove. “Evandar most likely locked it against her. Although, for all we know, Loddlaen may have been able to see it and tell her.”
“It seems more and more likely that the crystal’s on that island. So what we need to do, obviously, is bring Haen Marn back.”
“Obviously, she says.” Rori’s voice hovered near a growl. “And how, my dear Valandario, do you propose to bring it back?”
“Dweomer, of course.”
“Of course.” Rori slapped his tail hard on the ground. “Just like that, eh?”
“Will you stop that?” Dallandra snapped. “The tail banging, I mean. It makes the water in the kettle slop around.” She knelt down to rummage through her supplies, then brought out a pair of tongs to use instead of the glove.
“My apologies.” The dragon sounded less than apologetic.
Valandario once again gazed off at the distant horizon, using the lapis talisman for some sort of scrying or so Dallandra assumed. She used the tongs to fish the sop out of the herbwater and apply it to Rori’s wound. The dragon hissed with a long sigh of relief.
“The itch is gone, and the sting’s easing up. You’re a marvel with your medicaments, Dalla, you truly are.”
“My thanks.”
Valandario abruptly turned back to face them again. “But about Haen Marn,” Val said. “Is there any chance that this lapis talisman came from there?”
“No,” Rori said. “I wore it there, and no one remarked upon it. They would have had it been theirs.”
“I was afraid of that.” She looked Dallandra’s way. “I was hoping that it might be linked to Haen Marn. All I get from it is a very dim impression of a rock vein, probably the one this thing was mined from.”
“Life’s never that convenient, is it?” Dallandra shared her regret. A dweomer talisman from the island might have given off a far more useful impression. “Rori, you didn’t happen to bring a trinket or suchlike away with you, did you?”
“I didn’t. Naught except painful memories.” He began to speak in Deverrian, as he often did when talking of the past. “And since it’s gone, I can’t fly off and fetch—hold a moment! I’ve just remembered somewhat. There was a silver horn chained to a rock outside Haen Marn. You could blow it, and it would summon the boatmen. Well, it would if you were meant to visit the island. Now, after the place disappeared, the horn was left behind, but all smashed and tarnished. Still, it must have had some dweomer upon it.”
“It summoned,” Valandario pronounced the words carefully. “Dalla, its function is to summon.”
“The moon has horns when it’s new,” Dallandra said.
“And silver’s the metal of the moon!” Val threw both hands in the air and jigged a few dance steps.
Rori growled long and hard. “What by the pink arses of the gods are you two talking about?”
“Some omens, naught more.” Dallandra turned to him. “Where is this horn?”
“Enj has it, I think.”
“Enj?” Dallandra knew she’d heard the name before, but she failed to place it. “Who’s Enj?”
“Angmar’s son, born on Haen Marn. His father was one of the Mountain Folk, but Enj is a fair strange example of them, I’ll tell you. He lives most of the year in the wilderness, out under the sun, and only goes back to Lin Serr for the winter snows.”
“Very strange, then,” Valandario said.
“Well, only half of his mother’s blood came from the Mountain Folk,” Rori went on. “And he was raised above ground on the island. ”
“But he didn’t disappear along with the rest of them?”
“He wasn’t on the island at the time, Val. He was helping me find Arzosah.”
“I remember that bit,” Dallandra said. “Rori, can you bring Val that horn?”
“That depends on Enj. If he’ll part with it, I suppose I could fly hundreds of miles north and figure out a way to carry it and then fly all the way back again.”
“Well, by the Black Sun!” Val said. “It’s not like you’ve got anything better to do.”
“Naught but scout for our mortal enemies.” The dragon raised his tail as if to slap the ground, then gently laid it back down. “Or have you forgotten the Horsekin?”
“They’re to the north, aren’t they?” Val said. “Why can’t you do both at once?”
The dragon raised his head and glared at her. Val set her hands on her hips and stared into his eyes until, with a sigh, Rori looked away. “Flames and fumes!” he said. “Living around dweomerfolk could drive a man daft and a dragon even dafter.”
“There, there.” Dallandra patted his massive jaw. “Don’t forget, we’re discussing this in hopes of turning you back into your true form.”
“Just so,” Valandario said. “Now, if you could fetch me that horn, and if I can heal it so it sounds the dweomer spell again, and if Dalla and I can figure out the correct workings, well, then, we might be able to summon the island.”
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“Exactly.” Dalla said. “And if we actually manage to do all that, then let’s hope that the book does have the instructions for the dragon working in it. You never know with Evandar’s schemes.”
“True spoken.” The dragon heaved himself to his feet. “That’s the Guardians for you! But well and good then, I’m off to the Northlands. If Arzosah comes looking for me, you’d best not tell her where I’ve gone. I doubt me if she’ll take kindly to the idea of my turning back into a man.”
“I hadn’t thought of that.” Dallandra felt her stomach clench at the thought of Arzosah in a rage. “Um, we’ll ford that river when it’s time to cross. What else can we do?”
With a shrug of wing, the silver dragon waddled off, ridiculously clumsy in the grass. He waddled faster, bunched his muscles, and leaped into the air with a rush of wings like thunder booming, all grace, suddenly, and power, as he soared high and disappeared into the glare of the sun.
As he flew off, Rori was grumbling to himself about the arrogance of dweomerfolk, but soon enough the flying itself soothed him. He loved the feeling of soaring high above the earth, rising on the wind in splendid freedom, or swooping down only to spiral skyward again. At times, when he glided upon a favoring wind, it seemed to him that the world below was moving while he rested, master of the air.
If he returned to human form, he’d be giving up the power and the freedom of flight. That thought nagged him worse than his wound. And what would he get in return? Hands, he thought. It would be splendid to have hands again, and cooked food, and other such comforts. But those puny comforts could never compensate for the loss.
As he flew over the Melyn River, he considered turning back and telling Dallandra that the effort she would have to make was simply not worth it, that she and Valandario doubtless had more important work to do. What stopped him was the thought of Enj. If naught else, perhaps the two dweomermasters could bring the island back and Enj’s clan with it.
And what of Angmar? Rori asked himself. He’d longed for her return himself, once, a very long time ago now, it seemed to him when he thought about it. He could remember her so clearly, and remember his grief at losing her, but the grief had lost its sting. Missing Angmar, flying north each spring to see if Haen Marn had returned, stopping to speak with Enj—he’d performed these actions faithfully each year for over forty years now, until they’d taken on a distant quality, like a ritual performed by a priest while he merely watched.
Yet, for Enj the grief still lived. For the sake of his friend, Rori flew north on Valandario’s errand. He’d bring the horn back, he decided, then return to his scouting. As for the other matter, he would wait and see if it were even possible to walk the earth as a man instead flying so far above it. If it turned out to be possible, he’d make his decision then.
The river that flows through Lin Serr’s parkland seems to emerge like dweomer from under the dwarven city, but in truth, it runs above ground for most of its course. At the time of which we speak, few people knew its secret, but Enj was one of them. About twenty miles north of Lin Serr, an ordinary-looking river flowed into a canyon gouged from the limestone of an ancient sea floor, only to disappear under the cliff blocking the canyon’s southern end. It ran through caverns until it reached the city, and from there at last regained the sunlight.
Every spring, Enj left Lin Serr and hiked to that canyon, then followed the river north. It led after many windings to the general area in which Haen Marn had existed during its sojourn on the Roof of the World. At times Haen Marn’s own river had joined up with it, though at other times, it hadn’t. No one knew why or how the changes occurred; they followed, like everything about Haen Marn, some unknowable fluctuation within the inner planes of the universe.
Over the past forty years Enj had built himself a cabin in a mountain meadow near the previous location of his old home. Every spring he returned there, planted a vegetable garden, and spent the summer waiting just in case the island decided to return. As Rori had guessed, Enj did have the remains of the horn that had summoned the dragon boat from the island. Occasionally he would sit on the front steps of his cabin, hold the crushed lump of silver, green with tarnish, and weep over it while he wondered if he’d ever see the island again. At times he felt profoundly foolish for doing so, but the ritual gave him a certain amount of satisfaction, rather like biting on a sore tooth.
Enj had just finished one of these sessions and was putting the horn back into its leather storage pouch when he heard the thunder of approaching wings. He hung the pouch from a nail on the cabin wall, then strolled outside as the silver dragon landed. Rori waddled over to greet him.
“I did wonder when you’d be turning up,” Enj spoke the Mountain dialect of Deverrian. “The weather be about right for dragons.”
“It’s spring, truly,” Rori said. “Did you fare well over the winter?”
“Well enough. Lin Serr does weigh upon me after but a month or so, all that stone and short views.” Enj glanced around the broad meadow, dusted with the first pale green grass, ringed with distant pine forest. To the north, beyond the trees mountains rose, glittering with snow at the peaks. “This does suit me far better.”
“Me, too.” The dragon folded his enormous wings with a long rustle like collapsing canvas tents. “I’ve brought you some news. Two Westfolk dweomerworkers have taken up the task of bringing Haen Marn back.”
Enj tried to speak, couldn’t, felt tears gathering in his eyes. Irritably, he brushed them away with the back of his hand. “That does gladden my heart,” he said at last. “Think you that they’ll succeed?”
“If anyone can, they will.”
“If anyone can.”
Rori shrugged with a ripple of massive muscles. “If not, then we’ll have to go on hoping that the island makes its own way back.”
“True spoken, that.”
“They need somewhat of yours, though, the silver horn. They think that if they can heal it with dweomer, then it might help them summon the island.”
“I’ll give it over gladly in the hopes of seeing my mam and my home again. Will you carry it back?”
“I will, if you can fix up some sort of pouch that you can tie around my neck. That would be the safest way, I think.”
“I do have the pouch.” Enj paused, estimating the circumference of the dragon’s massive neck. “We’ll need a long fastening for it. I did kill a deer some weeks past, and I’ve been tanning the hide. ’Twill do to cut some strips for braiding, but the work will take some time.”
“We’ve waited forty years. We can wait a day or two more.”
They shared a laugh.
While Enj worked on cutting and braiding straps for the leather pouch, Rori flew off again to hunt. He returned two days later, bringing another dead deer with him—his dinner, though he had Enj butcher a haunch for himself. After Enj had put the haunch on a hook in a shady corner of the cabin to hang, and Rori had eaten the rest of the deer, Enj came back outside to join him.
“My thanks for the venison,” Enj remarked. “You were always a generous man, Rori.”
“A man, truly,” Rori said. “Once. Well, we’ll see what these dweomermasters can do. They have a plan, you see, to turn me back again, should I want.”
“Do you want?”
“I don’t know. At times I do, at times I don’t. Who knows if their plan will work, anyway? Dweomer’s like that. It always seems to be able to do what you don’t want, then fail on the things you do.”
“Bitter, bitter, eh? Still?”
The dragon growled under his breath, but Enj laughed, and the dragon eventually joined him.
“One thing I wonder about,” Rori said. “For as long as I’ve known you, you’ve not had the slightest trouble believing that dweomer exists and works in the world, yet other dwarven men I’ve met deny it. Deny it? They mock it.”
“That be so,” Enj said. “But I was born and raised on Haen Marn. They weren’t.”
“Of course. I should have
thought of that. Although you know, I once met a band of Mountain Folk who had a dweomermaster of their own, and he was a man, not a woman. They lived a fair bit differently than your folk, though. Their women walked around in the sunlight just like the men.”
Enj nearly choked on the thought. For a moment he could only goggle at the dragon like a half-wit. “Worms and slimes,” he said feebly. “And where did this marvel lie?”
“Down in Deverry proper. There’s some hills there—I would have called them mountains once, but now I’ve seen true mountains—so, hills on the border twixt Cantrae and Cwm Pecl. And some of your folk live inside them and farm above.”
Enj’s thoughts began to sort themselves out at last. “Another band of Mountain Folk?” he said. “This be the most interesting bit of news I’ve had in years, Rori. Now, I did hear about one other group of our brethren in an old tale about the ancient days. They did survive the first Horsekin attacks and tried to shelter with the Westfolk, but the Westfolk turned them away, and they were all slain.”
“I’ve heard that tale, too,” the dragon said, “but what if they weren’t killed? What if they fled east—east and south, that would be?”
Enj suddenly laughed. “Makes sense, truly. If so, that be one up on the old men like Otho, eh? For centuries they’ve clung to that bitter tale, pouring vinegar in their wounds over it, and now, by all the gods! It might not even be true.”
“When you go back to Lin Serr this winter, tell your loremasters, will you?”
“I will. You may rest assured about that.”
Enj brought out the remains of the silver horn and tied the pouch securely around the dragon’s neck. With a last call of farewell, Rori launched himself and flew off to the west. Enj stood in the cabin door and watched the dragon disappear into the sunny sky. For the first time in over forty years, he felt honest hope.
The Shadow Isle Page 11
